


Cool Stuff on a Hot Day

by orphan_account



Category: Fire Emblem Heroes, Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: (inhales) SUMMER TAKUMI, (rips out my lungs) take them just give me orbs, (slaps self in the face) "FISHIE BOW"?!, Friendship, Gen, Grouchypants, summer takumi is Best Boy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-10
Updated: 2018-07-10
Packaged: 2019-06-08 03:47:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15234642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Takumi loves the summer. Leo does not....But maybe it has its merits.





	Cool Stuff on a Hot Day

**Author's Note:**

> ever since i saw the banner preview i've been hoarding orbs and actually bothering to do chain challenges, i've got 32 and they're all going to TAKUMI
> 
> (fishie bow wtf who allowed him to be this cute)
> 
> i just had this idea a few hours ago ok pls i'm just so HYPE help

Leo hated the summer.

He hated that he was forced to be out on the beach, set out in the sun like a fine piece of salted meat. Only _he_ wouldn’t get dry and savory—his skin just turns a bright red, like a strawberry popsicle, except he’s angry and bitter.

He did not want to go to the shore. He did not care to watch Robin stab octopi with her special spears, or help Frederick take inventory of his shells. The fine tropical drinks that Camilla offered to the vacationing army managed to occupy him for a limited time, but he didn’t want to drink too much and add stomachaches to his woes, which also made Gaius’ saccharine seaside activities less appetizing. He might have appreciated the watermelons had they been cut with something sharp rather than crushed with a mallet ( _How wasteful is that?_ ). He thought he’d pass his time best with Elise or Corrin, but watching flowers grow from a spell was nothing new to him, and his heart ached whenever he saw how waterlogged Corrin’s tome was.

Leo grumbled to himself while crouched alone in the shade of a palm tree. The Askrians ran by, kicking up sand that undoubtedly got caught in the plates of their armor. He watched Kiran drag a beach chair just out of the tide’s reach and lie belly-down over it, still clad in his white cloak.

 _Someone needs to teach him how to tan,_ Leo thought. He poked a stinging red spot on his forearm and added, _But it definitely isn’t going to be me._

“Not going swimming, Milord?” Niles asked. He had been in the watermelon group and now joined Leo in the shade. He took a bite of a slice he brought back and fluid ran down his fingers so profusely that he had to shake out one of his hands.

Leo cringed, for more reasons than one. “I’ll pass. This sun is merciless on my skin. I’ll be redder than Prince Ryoma’s armor by the end of the day.”

“Wear sunscreen.”

“I did!”

“Did you reapply?”

“Every ninety minutes.”

“And waited twenty minutes before going in the sun right after a fresh application?”

“Thirty!”

Niles whistled. “And to think I forgot mine at the castle.”

Leo groaned. Some people were blessed in ways they didn’t realize.

From afar came a faint holler. Leo and Niles looked in its direction and saw Takumi, second prince of Hoshido, sprinting down the boardwalk. As he neared the edge, he leapt and threw his arms up. His ponytail fluttered in the wind before it plummeted down with the rest of his body. Xander’s Lilith floatie flew into the air, and Corrin dropped everything to dive in and help him back to shallower waters. Takumi’s head surfaced with a gasp, and he smacked a splash in Xander’s direction before helping him as well.

“Look at him,” Leo said enviously, “running around like he doesn’t have a care in the world. Well, if _I_ had Hoshidan skin I suppose I could also flaunt my ignorance about ultraviolet rays and their capabilities of burning and disfiguring and—” he shuddered, “— _aging_ you.”

“He just tans,” Niles concurred. 

When Takumi reached the shore, he looked around him. Hoshidans, Nohrians, Askrians, Ylisseans, Archaneans, Valentians, and all kinds of people from other nationalities he’d never known until being summoned were enjoying a leisurely day in the sun, mingling and gossiping and laughing and more. Everyone seemed to be having a great time. His eyes scanned the beach further, and he realized:

Everyone was having a great time except Leo.

Takumi walked the first few steps toward Leo as he shook the water out of his ear. He thought about how most of the people on the beach were strangers even though they didn’t seem to be. Takumi used to be friends with Leo where he was from, and though he had never been friends with _this_ Leo, they both knew that they missed each other and quickly became close.

As Takumi jogged toward him and Niles, Leo said, “You disgust me.”

See? BFFs.

“Come join the fun,” Takumi replied.

“It’s too hot,” Leo sighed.

“Then we’ll go in the water.”

“I’ll burn.”

“Have Niles carry an umbrella.”

“And I suppose you want me to bring a little plate of teatime cakes as well,” Niles said. He smoothly added, “Of course, I would do anything for my liege.” 

“You’re not doing that,” Leo said.

Takumi put his hand on his chin and pursed his lips. There was _one_ thing he could try to lure Leo to the water. After all, his curiosity was just about the only thing bigger than his ego. 

Takumi asked, “What if I told you I could show you something you’ve never seen before? Something that could only ever exist in story books.”

Leo looked up. Interest flickered in his eyes.

“I need to go grab something. I’ll also need you to follow me to the boardwalk. It’ll only take a moment in the sun, I promise.”

Leo reluctantly agreed. As Takumi ran in the direction opposite of the sea, Leo pulled up his hood and started making his way toward the boardwalk. He noticed Niles did not follow.

“Not coming?” he asked.

“I’ve seen it already,” Niles answered.

Leo was offended.

Takumi came running just as Leo took his first steps on the wooden boards. The sun turned Leo’s cloak into an oven, but hey—Sunburns last a week. Heat stroke lasts a day.

As they reached the end of the walk, where there was no railing, Takumi said, “Pull down your hood. You’re gonna want a full view of this.”

“You’ll be the end of me,” Leo muttered, but he pulled down his hood anyway.

Takumi held a funny contraption in his hands. In one, he held what looked like half a life raft, and in the other he held a rod tipped with a clownfish.

Leo smirked. “Your beach toys?”

“Shh, they’re cool.”

Takumi walked to the very edge of the boardwalk. He leaned close to the water, and Leo had to step closer to see what he was doing. Takumi made a scooping motion near the surface. As he stood, he aimed the rod away from their allies. Droplets of water had harderned into dense crystal and a fine string, and it became clear that Takumi was wielding a bow.

He cast a sideward glance at Leo and asked, “You ready?”

“Woo me,” Leo said flatly.

Little did he know that under them, beneath the boards and deep below the still surface of the water, a current was swishing and spiraling and stringing along bits of sealife—not so much as if hooked on a line but rather as if they were drawn to a dazzling light. Takumi let his arrow loose, and as it flew, thick streams flowed after it, painting the sky with suspended channels where fishes that were the colors of the rainbow flitted and flowed. Leo gaped at the vibrant reds of anthiases, the contrasting pinks and yellows of the dottybacks, the reflective greens of the chromises and those trademark stripes of the clownfishes. He could barely make out the blues of the damselfishes, which blended in with the sky and the sky’s reflection. He saw skinny, shiny little slivers, and stripes that ran perpendicular on the wide bodies of the butterflyfishes and angelfishes.

Leo stood before a wall of sealife without a sheet of glass in between. It was an impossible, abstract aquarium that no man could have, and Takumi had chosen to share this with him. 

For a moment, Leo forgot that he was standing in the sun.

Soon, droplets of water began to rain down, angled toward the path of Takumi’s arrow. The streams ran through the sky until they thinned, and the fish swam home. Leo watched until there was nothing left in the air but the scent of saltwater.

Takumi placed his hands on his hips, smug. He puffed out his chest and said, “So? Cool, right?”

There was a grin on Leo’s face that he wasn’t aware of until it stretched wider.

“It was great,” he replied. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. And now that you’re out here…” Takumi lay his weapon down on dry ground, and with a mischievous grin he cornered Leo at the edge of the boardwalk—where (as a reminder) there was no railing. “Prepare to swim with the fishes.”

Leo felt a pit in his stomach.

He knew he shouldn’t have trusted Takumi.


End file.
